Raiders HOF semifinalists

Former Raiders among the 25 players who named as semifinalists for the Pro Football Hall of Fame Class of 2010

WR Cliff Branch, 1972-85: Al Davis campaigns hardest for Ray Guy, Jim Plunkett and Tom Flores, but Branch is the guy with the biggest gripe. A regular-season and postseason star. Contemporaries included Lynn Swann and John Stallworth, both in the HOF. I’d take Branch over either one.

WR/KR Tim Brown, 1988-2003: There are going to be some surprised people in Raider Nation when Brown doesn’t make it in his first year. Like it or not, there are a lot of voters who look at Brown’s stats and don’t see enough wins or a defining moment. They consider him like a 28 ppg scorer on a bad NBA team. Someone has to put up the numbers, even if they don’t mean all that much.

If Cris Carter wasn’t a first-ballot pick, neither is Brown.

RB Roger Craig, 1991: Gained 591 yards, averaged 3.6 yards per carry, scored one touchdown and had no run longer than 16 years in an end-of-the-line season after piling up terrific rushing-receiving numbers with the 49ers. That wouldn’t stop the Raiders from putting him their media guide should he be inducted _ which he won’t in 2010.

P Ray Guy, 1973-86: Two problems _ there are simply too many voters who will never vote for a punter. Ridiculous, of course. It’s a huge part of the sport, and you can leave it to Canton visitors to bypass his bust if they’re offended. Then there’s the “There goes the neighborhood” issue. Guy’s career stats are being obliterated by Shane Lechler, the heir to his legacy in silver and black. That makes the voters think, “You mean we’ll have to put in another punter some day?

CB Lester Hayes, 1977-86: Never clear as to why Hayes isn’t taken more seriously as a candidate. Think Charles Woodson is having a great season for the Packers this year? It’s not even close to what Hayes did in 1980 _ the single best season any defensive back has ever had. “The Judge” had 39 career interceptions and made five Pro Bowls.

WR Jerry Rice, 2001-04: In 2001 and 2002, Rice caught 175 passes for 2,350 yards and 16 touchdowns following two sub-1,000 yard season playing second-fiddle to Terrell Owens in San Francisco. In 2003, Rice finally started to show some age, catching 63 passes for 869 yards. He turned 41 that season. Those numbers are looking pretty good to the Raiders about now.

Look for Rice’s bio in your Raiders media guide next year, and deservedly so. Two great years and a turn-back-the-clock playoff game against the Jets following the 2001 season (9 catches, 183 yards, one touchdown) added to his legacy.

“Trestman had interviewed to return as the Raiders’ offensive coordinator in January of 2009 before Tom Cable decided he was going to appoint himself to the post. That appointment has been a decided disappointment and with Trestman securing the coveted Grey Cup as a head coach, he may now have his sights a bit higher than just coordinator.”

LMFAO Cable must have a career death wish! No, no, no, forget you Trestman, I can call the plays! I will beat defenses like I beat my women…hard and fast! Just win baby!

For some reason this Jason Smith, #2 pick in this past draft, concussion story isn’t gaining much attention, but I am on it.

First, the guy has struggled mightily at RT in pass protection. Than he got a concussion in practice, and was inactive from the game, yet still was hospitalized while vomiting on the sideline. Crowd-noise made him dizzy, he said.

Damaged goods? Not a good start that’s for sure.

Again, it is not the position we draft that is the issue, it is the players.

Eugene Monroe and Jason Smith don’t seem to be very good, and might not have long NFL careers. If we would have drafted them, we would not be any better today.

Don’t you believe there might be a connection between draft picks struggling and being drafted by Schytty teams?

I seriously doubt Percy Harvin would be having a good season right now if he played for the Oakland Raiders. And Michael Oher got to go to a great team that has stability and a history of good o-line play in Baltimore…if he had gone to the Rams he might be struggling just as much as Smith.

I think a young player’s struggles has almost as much to do with who he was drafted by as opposed to the player’s abilities.

Chris Johnson very well could be a great RB, but place him on the Raiders and put McFadden on Tenn and I doubt Chris would be as great as he is right now and McFadden wouldn’t look nearly as bad as he does right now.

….but DHB wouldn’t be catching passes anywhere….

Florida Pete

c’mon Dakota…

nobody taught McTiptoe how to trip over blades of grass…

but you’re right about DHB…

he simply cannot catch…

Larz

Trestmans Allouettes won the Grey Cup yesterday.

He has been noted by all the players and staff as the main reason for their success.

A class act all the way, probably too nice a guy for the NFL.

Florida Pete

Larz Says:
November 30th, 2009 at 9:14 am
Ricky Ray had a cup of coffee with the Jets.

Surely there is a correlation, I don’t doubt that. But a baller is a baller. You see Chris Johnson’s runs, is it the “stability” of Tennessee or the fact that he routinely breaks open-field tackles and makes guys miss in space. D-Mac doesn’t do any of this.

Percy Harvin would be having a helluva a lot better year than DHB, that’s for sure, and is a fantastic kick-returner. He didn’t learn to break tackles, be a play-maker, have great hands and be an electric open-field runner at Minnesota in 6 months, he had it all along.

St. Louis stinks and usually they do, but they developed maybe the greatest LT ever in Orlando Pace. The record of the Rams has nothing do with Jason Smith, at least in his rookie year, not being able to handle the physicality of the NFL.

So while you are right to an extent, no matter what teams you place DHB and Harvin on, Percy would be making a lot more plays, and Oher would be hammering people more than Monroe and Jason Smith. At least IMO.

Florida Pete

Larz Says:
November 30th, 2009 at 9:21 am
I would love to see Popp (the Montreal GM) and Trestman get a chance at turning around a NFL franchise.

They are 10 times better than 3/4 of the team execs and coaches in the NFL today.

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sounds like a plan to me…

actually…

any cognitive plan… that has a start and an end… the end being a consistently winning team…

Do you have text MSG on your phone? I sent you a text this weekend.
Dude, thank you so much for the CD, you are a great friend. It was the highlight of a really bad weekend. My friends daughter has a brain tumor, my car at the shop needs $1400 to get fixed, I have to pay cash AGAIN for school, and my grades are suffering because I’m very stressed. I’m also having problems with my business!
I can’t remember the last time I was so stressed. ( don’t worry guys, I’m not going to do anything crazy).
Thank God for the green, friends like you, and good music!

Dude, you don’t need to explain yourself. I took it just as you said, it was a joke.

Florida Pete

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RaiderRockstar

after watching the game on Thanksgiving, I must say:

I am not impressed with ANY of our WR’s …

not Heyward-Bey, not Murphy, not Schilens. McFadden has better hands than any of them and he’s had fumble issues to work out. He also fights for the ball and gives 100 percent. those other clowns weren’t hungry

Bruce got taken down 2 or 3 times, but he was pressured an awful lot. his mobility is an asset, but he clearly has a noodle arm. the o-line is STILL garbage in pass protection

the running game was solid, but when we got down by 10 points Cable stopped calling for the runs. Fargas actually averaged over 5 yards per carry! Zach Miller continues to impress. Seabass & Shane are dominant

RaiderRockstar

on defense i was glad that we brought the pressure. Even giving up big plays in the run game, we still could have overcame those imo. Sam Williams covering Jason Witten is a joke. I hate to say this, but it’s true: nobody on the field could cover Miles Austin. He got the better of not only Johnson & Routt, but Asomugha. he made Nnamdi look like an average corner. thats rare

Branch should have been there to help CJ on that TD pass to Roy Williams. he should have been the one to shadow Witten too. I saw some good plays from Warren, Morrison, Scott & Huff on defense. Kelly, Seymour & Howard were invisable. it was like they disappeared or something?

The “Possession” Crabtree’s longest completion is 38 yards. He has several catches over 20 yards.

By the way, the League Average this year for WRs is 287 yards. (Crabtree is higher than that in only 5 games)

Funny how some guys on here claim Crabtree is NOTHING but a possession WR and DHB has all this potential due to his “speed”

Crabtree has the same yards per catch average as DHB and has connected on longer pass plays.

Crabtree’s last game he had 4 catches for 77 yards. That’s a 19 yard per catch average.

Crabtree has a 58 yards per game average compared to DHB’s 13 yards per game.

Yeah, that DHB pick is looking better and bet

^^^^^^^^
One of the many STUPID and Brainless Al Davis picks that I have seen in my life. Didn’t think it could get worse than drafting a freakin kicker in the 1st round, but making a pick that shouldn’t even have been an option at #7 just shows how much Al Davis has lost it.

Picking DHB over guys like Crabtree, Harvin, Monroe, Oher, and even Maclin and not even trading down was flat out one of the worst draft day decisions I have ever seen!

Thanks again to AL DAVIS fro RUINING the Raider franchise!

Us REAL fans of the Raider Nation who are not your lap dogs….appreciate it you screwing this franchise up!

Now go away!

RaiderRockstar

hey Vegas, 4eva, Raider O!

hope you guys had a great Thanksgiving weekend

DKnight007

# islandraider Says:
November 29th, 2009 at 11:58 pm

The Raiders have a team payroll of $152,389,371.00 (league high) and they sit at the bottom of most offensive and defensive league stats.

Al, you pay the most and get the least.
Truly bizarro!

^^^^^^^Moe proof that Al Davis is a JOKE!

RaiderRockstar

no 1 man can effectively run an entire pro football franchise by himself.